VIDEO: Gallego Talks Europe, Reducing Civilian Harm at Hearing with Secretary of Defense
Click here to watch a stream of the full committee hearing.
Here are Rep. Gallego’s full questioning to Sec. Austin:
Rep. Gallego: Secretary Austin, can you explain the concept of integrated deterrence in a little more detail? Are there any examples you can share where we have seen it succeed thus far, especially if there's any NATO examples?
Sec. Austin: I think you heard me say a bit earlier that integrated deterrence really means using all the capability and capacity in all of the war fighting domains: air, land, sea, cyber and space, and linking and networking those capabilities together in new ways to provide, to create synergies. And you're seeing us do that in a number of areas. It also involves leveraging the capability and capacity of our allies. And again, I mentioned earlier that we've done that in the past, but we need to do that a lot better, not only on air, land and sea, but also in space and cyber. And many of our allies have significant capability there as well.
Rep. Gallego: Secretary Austin, just to follow up on that, one of the things I was very happy that you had in your written remarks is the steps we've taken with our allies to bolster NATO's eastern flank. In fact, one of my proudest moments in Congress thus far is securing an authorization for the Baltic Secure Initiative, which provides targeted defense systems to Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, including in air defense ammunition and C4ISR across these capabilities or others. Are there particular areas where you would like to deepen defense and military to military cooperation between the United States and the Baltic countries? And which capabilities do you think are most important for the Baltic states to prioritize?
Sec. Austin: Well, some of them have some pretty significant capabilities in cyber, and I think they can add to our already robust inventory here. But, but I think things like cyber in air and missile defense, we'd like to see them to begin to develop more capabilities there and work together with their with their neighbors to link those capabilities together.
Rep. Gallego: Thank you. And then, Secretary Austin, again, you referenced gray zone multiple times and you've written testimony noting our competitors malign activities in it. One of my greatest concerns is Russia's ability to exploit the gray zone and to conduct targeted disinformation operations, spreading Putin's propaganda and blatant lies over the long term. I'm also concerned about the lessons that China is drawing from Russia and the space itself. Could you share your perspective on how our forces can be more effective operating in this gray zone of conflict? What short and long term steps should we be taking to counter this malign influence from Russia right now and from China, too, as it becomes more adept at spreading disinformation operating in the gray zone?
Sec. Austin: We have been very active in, you know, before the onset of our hostilities here with the Ukrainians and helping them with their cyber capabilities and helping them develop methods to begin to counter some of the activity in the gray zone. And we can this is a learning process. We continue to learn. Thus far, I think we've been very effective in helping them. And they have been able to push back on a number of unhelpful narratives and stay ahead of the power curve, actually. So there are, there will be a number of lessons learned coming out of this. But I think I think we've grown in our awareness in terms of what it takes to be able to begin to be effective in countering unhelpful narratives in the information space.
Rep. Gallego: Thank you. And then lastly, one more time, I'd like to talk to you about the civilian harm mitigation response action plan. As you well know, civilian harm caused by U.S. military operations risks our legitimacy overseas, including what we've already seen with the reaction to Russia. So I was proud to lead a letter with a bunch of members. My understanding is that the review is still ongoing under the 90 day window that you directed, but could you share any insight you've learned so far from this process.
Sec. Austin: I'm not prepared to share insights at this point. I would just, the only insight I have is that the, you know, the folks that we've assembled to work on this are very detailed and very committed to doing this the right way. And these are people from a number of communities to include the active warfighters. And so we still have work to do. And, you know, the review is about 30 days out in terms of the brief out of the of the review. So once that's done, I'll be happy to share any insights and lessons learned from this, and also prescribe our way ahead.
Rep. Gallego: Thank you. I yield back my time.